It seemed to me that Sony had a big-picture vision for the PS3: make it the centerpiece for home media delivery, something that other platforms like Windows Media Center XP-based PCs so far have failed to deliver on. Gaming is only part of the equation, albeit a big part. Frankly, no one really has to have BluRay just for game delivery. But also no one outside of the BluRay consortium is really sure if they need BluRay AT ALL, considering the confusion that's already happening with the hi-def disc market.
Given that, the comments from SCEA exec Tetsuhiko Yasuda sort of makes sense. He states that the PS3 and the Xbox 360 aren't competitors, which at first blush seems as if it's a slam on the 360. But taken from the standpoint of what Sony intends for the PS3, Yashda's statements make sense in that the 360's role is primarily as a next-gen gaming rig; everything else is definitely secondary, if that. Sony's grand vision for the PS3 certainly still features gaming at the core, but the multimedia component sets it apart from the 360 (or so Sony hopes).
Personally, I'd be more inclined to buy into the success of the latter scenario if the PS3 was a product from a certain Cupertino company. Woe is Sony that the iPod exists and that from a practical standpoint Redmond isn't their vaunted PS3's only "competition". Sony is banking on the added bonus of BluRay content delivery, but somehow I don't think the typical middle-class family will buy into everyone sharing time on a single central machine, even if BluRay wins out over HD-DVD. The more I try to reason WHY Sony was so adamant over including BluRay, besides jump-starting THEIR chosen format (assuming everyone in the consortium finally get together on the same page), the less I think its inclusion is really a good thing for the PS3.
If nothing else, statements like Yasuda's set the groundwork for a pricing structure that's more expensive than the price point where MSFT has the 360 at. "It does more, so its price should be more", or something like that. Whether or not the Sony faithful buy into that is another matter. If indeed the PS3 initally costs $900 a pop to build (Merrill Lynch's initial price for the Cell CPU seems light to me for something that's supposed to blow away the very best that AMD and Intel currently make and $ell, but what do I, AMD and Intel know?), then that's a LOT of faith that Sony is going to be asking of their fanbase, even IF Sony is willing to take a major bath on each unit sold.